Home challenge - week 22 - dining room and eating area

In our house we don't have a formal dining room as such. We have the main kitchen table (6 seater), which is in the family room and an larger (8 seater) outdoor table.  We like eating outdoors in summer but lately, despite the cold, we have been eating outside. And the reason for that is our kitchen table looks like this:

If it's really too cold we just push things aside so we can all have a spot to eat. So the challenge to organise the kitchen eating area is timely for me. Eating together as a family is very important to me. It's the one time we get to be together and we say what we are grateful for! I couldn't imagine not having an evening meal together at the dinner table (before we had the kids hubby and I used to eat our dinner on our laps watching TV - not a habit I want to get the kids into!).

Decluttering the table isn't a biggie....hubby and I did a quick run around and in about 5-10 minutes we made it look like this:

Now the big challenge for me is keeping it like this! Our cleaner cleans the table if it's clear - so we tend to clear it up once a fortnight so it can be cleaned properly - but I would like it to stay in this clear state constantly! Now that it's clear again I'm going to give a good crack and keeping it clear!